Notes From The Field by Massad Ayoob Massad Ayoob has been writing in gun magazines since 1971, and founded the Lethal Force Institute in 1981. He is the author of numerous books and training films on the use of defensive tactics and weaponry. TLR-1® The current trend in policing (and in home defense) is for the light attachment to be "dedicated" to the gun. However, the time may come (for cops who don't have holsters issued that can carry light-affixed pistols) or for armed citizens, when they must attach the light to the loaded gun in a fast-breaking emergency. The Streamlight design, in which the illumination unit rolls onto the pistol's frame from the side, keeps the user's hand from crossing the muzzle of a loaded handgun. The TLR works fine, of course, when attached to the gun before the emergency erupts. It has the ergonomics and simplicity that are essential in life-threatening crisis moments. The ability to both identify a lethal assailant (or, just important, to identify a non-threat), and to blind a genuinely deadly attacker in the critical fractions of seconds before shots must be fired, are what make technology like the TLR-1 so important when protecting innocent people from potentially lethal threats. An often neglected advantage of units such as the TLR-1 and TLR-2 is that in lethal close quarters grappling situations, most semiautomatic pistols will have their slides pushed back "out of battery" and will be rendered incapable of firing if the user must thrust the gun against the opponent firmly and pull the trigger, to survive. The TLR, by extending beyond the gun's muzzle, creates a little-known but life-saving "muzzle stand-off capability" that allows the officer or armed citizen to make this shot without jamming the gun, for first or follow-up rounds. TLR-2®: Tests conducted at Lethal Force Institute showed us that in extremely poor light, night sights were better than ordinary sights…a flashlight was better than no flashlight…a white light mounted to the firearm was distinctly better than any of the above…and white light plus laser-aiming was by a small but apparent margin the best of all in terms of combined ability to identify the situation and to hit what needed to be shot, in very rapid time frames. The TLR-2 shares the TLR-1's ability to be safely mounted on a loaded gun because it can rotate on from the side without the hand having to come in front of the "business end." Its ergonomics are natural and easily learned, and give even the person under extreme stress the ability to choose between white light, laser aim, or both at once. Also in common with the TLR-1, once the TLR-2 is engaged it permits one-handed operation, leaving the support hand free to handle communications or other critical emergency functions. It also gives the pistol the little-understood, but sometimes critical, "muzzle stand-off capability" that allows the gun to fire when its front end must be pressed against a lethal opponent's body in a close-quarters, fast-breaking, life-or-death situation. Finally, the laser-sighting option of the TLR-2 is a tremendous "teaching tool" for both student and instructor, teaching the importance of a smooth trigger pull with the firearm on target, and (in dim-light live-fire environments) literally drawing a red graph that shows recoil control capability.